The Ten Commandments puzzle
March 11, 2005
Fred Hutchison
RenewAmerica analyst
  |
|
Justices Off Balance
Several of the Supreme Court judges seem off balance or out of sorts when they make candid remarks about the Ten Commandments issue. Justice Kennedy — who in recent years voted boldly with the liberals in counter-cultural cases — is a different man on this question. "If an atheist walks by he can hide his eyes," he said with uncharacteristic bluntness. Furthermore, banning the Texas display might "show hostility to religion." Hostility to religion is contrary to the spirit of the "free exercise" clause of the First Amendment. Liberals justices are not so sure of themselves on this one. Liberal Justices John Paul Stephens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg have acknowledged the role of the Ten Commandments in the nation's legal and cultural history, but have also wondered where the line should be drawn. Interestingly, the liberal judges have not yet sided with the assertions of the plaintiffs and their ACLU lawyers that the display of the Commandments in public places is "an endorsement of religion," or that the motives of the defendants were to propagate their own religious views. After all, who can know what were the true motives of the plaintiffs, and why would the liberals judges want to make an issue of their motives? For that matter, how many people outside the ACLU will see a Ten Commandments display in a court house as religious proselytizing?
|
 |
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who has no known ideology, prefers tradition like a conservative but often decides a case based upon feelings like a liberal. She is the prototype of a moderate swing vote judge. On issues of religious symbols in public places and phrases like "One Nation Under God" and "In God We Trust," O'Connor prefers tradition and feels that a vague "Civic Deism" is acceptable to the court. The Justice Department, who will defend Texas and Kentucky before the court has adopted an O'Connor defense, on the theory that if they can sway O'Connor, they can win the case five to four. The Bush Administration, the Justice Department, and twenty-six state attorneys have submitted a brief to the court which says, "Official acknowledgment and recognition of the Ten Commandments' influence on legal history comport with the Establishment Clause..." (of the First Amendment). However, O'Connor is wavering in an agony of indecision. "It is so hard to draw that line..." (between allowing legislative prayer and not allowing the Ten Commandments display), she fretted. (sources:about the court: Associated Press, 3/2/05, CNN.com, 3/2/05 and Bloomberg.com)
The most amazing thing of all is that there has been no discussion whatever about whether the Ten Commandments case falls within the jurisdiction of a federal court. The First Amendment forbids Congress to establish a national church. The clearly expressed purpose of the founders was not to interfere with the states on the issue of state established churches. Different states initially wanted to establish different denominations, and some states wanted no established church at all. The First Amendment also forbids Congress from interfering with the "free exercise" of an established state church. If congress has no jurisdiction, it logically implies that a federal court has no jurisdiction. If the display of the Ten Commandments represents the establishment of a denomination as a established state church, federal courts have no jurisdiction. If the display of the Commandments does not represent such an establishment, the federal courts still have no jurisdiction. Why then is there no discussion of constitutional jurisdiction? Does the postmodern court arbitrarily seize whatever jurisdiction it wants and simply dispense with discussions of constitutional jurisdiction?
An Unnerved Professor
|
 |
Let us explore this strained soul-searching. First, the professor. He starts off with: "Well how can anyone besides the devil object to the Ten Commandments?" He does not want us to fail to notice how ambivalent he is and how he does not want to come down on the side of evil. Visions come to mind of the professor trembling at the Last Judgment and giving account for why he opposed the Ten Commandments. But we soon find that the public display of the Ten Commandments also unsettles him. "The first four Commandments are theological, and they exclude, reject, alienate..." (people of other religions). The idea of not being inclusive and potentially offending protected identity groups is contrary to academic political correctness and thus is vexing to the good professor. Extraordinary efforts must be made to prevent any member of a racial, ethnic, or religious minority from having hurt feelings. The professor puts his emphasis on "placing yourselves in the shoes of others," and imagining how they might feel. It is a feel-good version of Christ's Golden rule, But what has all this to do with law? Jesus said that obeying His Golden Rule fulfills the law (Matthew 7:12), which means it fulfills the Ten Commandments. If the professor was consistent about banning the display of the Ten Commandments he would also insist that we must not use the Golden Rule to determine what is legitimate in law because it came from the lips of Christ as a guide to fulfilling scriptural law. The professor is unwittingly using biblical law to argue against biblical law. It is very difficult to strip civil law of biblical content and have something viable that remains. The best we can do is hide the sources as the professor disguises the Golden Rule as putting yourself into the shoes of others. What he probably means to say is that legitimate law does not hurt people's feelings. Or does it? Justice Sandra Day O'Connor might live in a world of jurisprudence by feelings, but law which does not offend is just as problematical as law with the scriptural foundations removed.
 |
|
The professor thinks that people of other religions are ignorant of these laws. Not so. Even pagans know them because the moral law is written upon their hearts and some of them practice moral behavior because of this knowledge. (Romans 2:14) The professor recalled Russian atheists who did not know the Ten Commandments and were still moral as though they did know the Commandments. He thought this was due to upbringing and "imagining ourselves in another's shoes." But how could a purely atheistic upbringing achieve the obedience to moral laws if the laws were not written on every heart? Incidentally, the moral atheists the professor knew in Communist Russia would be put in the Gulag if they stepped out of line. No wonder they behaved themselves. We are free Americans and do not need the threat of the Gulag to keep us straight if we heed the moral law and our internal moral constraints
What good then does it do to display the Commandments? On the one hand, it stirs up resentment. On the other hand, we already know the commands in our hearts. So who needs it? The Commandments confirm and reinforce what is already in the heart. That reinforcement is helpful because the dark side of human nature is at war with the conscience and the Commandments written upon the heart. Without the display of the Commandments, it is easier to stifle the conscience,
|
 |
Again, the display of the Ten Commandments is an equal opportunity offense. It offends Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, and Atheists equally because the same law is written on every heart. No exclusion here. Nothing on earth could be less like establishing a favored denomination. We are all united in condemnation for failing to live up to the same commandments. Next to this, the offense that an immigrant with a exotic religion might feel because the commands come from the Christian Bible seem like peccadilloes. But an actual immigrant is not likely to think that way. He is likely to be amazed that he recognizes the commandments — from somewhere — perhaps from his own holy books, or from traditions of his tribe, or from his parents, or from his own heart. He is more likely to think, "I am essentially like the people who erected these commandments" than, "I am different from them."
The professor does not like the first four Commandments because they are theologically exclusive, and he does not like the last six because they command us to do something. Passive religious symbols, like Christmas trees are fine, but authoritative commands are scary. Here I seem to notice a strain of hysteria in our otherwise sensible, mild mannered professor. He confesses to be unnerved by Judge Scalia's statement that God grants civil government its authority to rule. In his panic, he fears that Scalia is advocating something like the divine right of kings. This might be regarded as self-indulgent pandering to a liberal bogeyman. I just heard a liberal on TV say that the Evangelicals are pushing America towards "theocracy light." Could anyone who is free from paranoia actually believe that? Do liberals have panic attacks when they walk past a Ten Commandments display in a courthouse, or do they just enjoy scary hyperbole?
The professor's imaginative paranoia also runs to lurid scenes of the traumatizing of minorities with a different theology. He supposes that Catholics, with their statutes of saints, will be offended by the prohibition on "graven images" (carved idols), or that Muslims will be offended by the promise that those who honor father and mother will "live long on the land," assuming that the land refers to the promised land of the Hebrews. Our imaginative professor is diligently searching high and low for someone who might be offended. Is this a liberal version of a witch hunt? However, some conservatives seem just as temporarily deranged by the Ten Commandments issue as our brave professor. Both left and right are out of kilter.
A Confused Conservative
|
 |
Dr. R.C. Sproul, famous contemporary theologian of the reformed tradition, gave a talk on the Ten Commandments a while back. When he got to "Thou shalt not kill," he explained that it was a mistranslation. The Commandment is "You shall not murder." Capital punishment by the state is killing but it is not murder. After carefully distinguishing the powers and commands God gives to government and commands he gives to individuals Sproul said, "We do not want the state to be the church. We want the state to be the state." The answer to Cal Thomas is that Evangelicals display the Commandments in courthouses not because they want the state to be the church but because they want the state to be the state. The Commandments have a bearing upon law and justice which is administered by the state. The divine laws assist legislators in formulating human laws. According to scripture, the weight of God's authority is behind the civil magistrate as he captures and imprisons evil doers and subjects them to justice (Romans 13:1-7).
By contrast, when the Ten Commandments are displayed or taught in a church, they have a different aim. The commands help us to distinguish right from wrong. They also help us to realize us how far we have fallen short of God's standards and therefore how much we need Christ for salvation and for the process of spiritual growth and sanctification.
Final Speculations
Why does this generation get so muddled and unnerved when dealing with the Ten Commandments question? In this heyday of relativism, pragmatism, and secularism, modern man has lost the knack of dealing with metaphysical questions. Since Immanuel Kant's critique of metaphysics, it suffered something of a collapse and has never fully recovered, even in its natural home of orthodox Christianity. Cal Thomas is orthodox in doctrine but intellectually faints from the heavy lifting that metaphysics requires. Metaphysics, a branch of philosophy, is the study of first principles and the nature of ultimate reality. The Ten Commandments touch upon three branches of metaphysics: ontology (the study of being), cosmology (the study of the structure of the universe), and epistemology (what we can know and how we know it).
 |
|
After the collapse of metaphysics came the postmodern revolt against reason. Reason was reduced to pragmatic ends and the rationalizing of feelings and moral relativism. This use of reason to rationalize feelings describes our confused professor. Interestingly, his academic specialty is philosophy, yet metaphysics is as alien to him as it would be to a headhunter in Borneo. Therefore, he irrationally suffers from bogeymen and paranoid fantasies much as the headhunter suffers from forest fears.
The collapse of metaphysics and the revolt against reason explains why the high court can usurp whatever jurisdiction it wants and dispense with even a discussion of constitutional jurisdiction. The O'Connor court can talk about feelings and motives and who might be offended as they grope their way to a fuzzy decision. But the judges are disconcerted, confused and out of sorts. As they pick at the Ten Commandments question, the universal moral law frowns down upon them from its high metaphysical perch and creates in them an inner conflict which they cannot adjudicate away.
RenewAmerica analyst Fred Hutchison also writes a column for RenewAmerica.
© 2005 Fred Hutchison
|
|